1 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap. ...£. .3.1 
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



A DISCOURSE 



DELIVERED AT THE REQUEST OF THE 



dbriter flf flniteii Immrang, 



TRIPLER HALL, NEW-YORK, 

Feb. 22d, 1851, 

BEING THE 118th ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTHDAY OF 
WASHINGTON. 



BY / 

DAVID EVERETT WHEELER, 

FACIE TENENS. 

f 1875. ; 

NEW-YORK: 

JOHN F. TROW, 49 ANN-STREET. 
1851. 






.1 



New-York, March 4th, 1851. 
Chancery of the State of New-York. 

Dear Sir : 

The undersigned were appointed a Committee by the " Chancery of the 
State of New- York," to request a copy of the Discourse delivered by you 
before " the Order of United Americans," in Tripler Hall, on the 118th An- 
niversary of Washington's birth-day, for publication. 

The Committee unite in this request, and trust that its publication and 
distribution will advance the cause of our noble and patriotic Order. 
With the highest regard for your present and future welfare, 
We remain yours, in the bonds of our order, 

Minard Lafever. 



Richard Ebbkts, 
E. B. Brush. 



To Hon. David Everett Wheeler. 



New- York, March 11th, 1851. 
Gentlemen : 

Your very polite note, requesting in behalf of "The Chancery of the 
State of New- York," and yourselves personally, a copy of my Discourse de- 
livered at Tripler Hall 6n the 118th Anniversary of Washington's birth- 
day, for publication and distribution, has been received, and is gratefully 
acknowledged. 

This mark of respect, added to the complimentary request to deliver 
the Discourse, the favor with which it was received, and the expressed 
wish of many friends to read it, have induced me to publish it ; and with 
the hope that its distribution will advance the cause, and spread the prin- 
ciples of our noble and patriotic order, it will delight me to place a copy 
in your hands, and in the hands of those with whom we are associated as 
brothers. 

With a grateful sense of the honor done me, 

I am fraternally yours, 



D. E. Wheeler. 



To Minard Lafever, } 

Richard Ebbets, > Committee, &c. 

E. B. Brush. Esqs. S 






AjV 






DISCOURSE. 



The sentiment which has called this vast assem- 
bly together, has found an abiding place in the 
heart of man from the first periods of his history. 
It is a part of his nature. It is one great source of 
consolation in his sufferings, one great source of joy 
in his journeying through life. # It forms landing- 
places to look back upon the past, and furnishes a 
footpath for the future. 

The mother remembers the anniversary of her 
anguish, and the joy that her first-born boy gave her, 
and each return awakens new hopes, creates new 
throbbings, as she looks upon the pride of her life 
in his progress ; and if his earthly career is closed 
before hers, her grief goes out afresh in its annual 
burstings, and she not unfrequently goes alone to 



moisten the green sod where her beautiful boy is 
laid. 

The father, too, is not unmindful of the annual 
visitings of birthdays, but rejoices in them, when 
they give him evidence that his children are ad- 
vancing in life, and promising more than he has 
been able to accomplish for himself, his wife, and his 
little ones. He, too, is bowed down with sorrow on 
the anniversary of the birthday of a child if he has 
been obliged to see the object of his hopes mantled 
in eternity's sleep, and taken to its final resting- 
place. 

The child, too, how he bounds when he awakens 
in the morning, and finds that it is the anniversary 
of his birth, that«he is a year older, that he is near- 
er to manhood ! What a struggle to be better ! 
What promises of the future ! Aye, it is a renewal 
of life to him. It is the goal he has been looking 
forward to for a twelvemonth. He is more manly, 
and when his bright eye meets those of his fellows, 
of his mother, of his father, there is a mutual greet- 
ing one cannot describe. The painter has tried it, 
but his pencil has failed. The poet has taken his 
pen, but he has not accomplished his purpose. No, 



it requires a touch from nature's God, to make mani- 
fest this deep sentiment. It is more than the voice 
of one crying in the wilderness. It is more than 
the fire upon the altar in the Sapphire Throne. 
It is nature herself. 

If, then, this sentiment is so general, so absorbing, 
can it be surprising that we have come up hither to- 
day ? Can it be surprising that the birth of that boy, 
which took place in Virginia, one hundred and nine- 
teen years ago to-day, whom Mary his mother called 
George, should be celebrated by us ? Surprising in- 
deed would it be if the heart of an American could 
be fotmd on such a day untouched by such a senti- 
ment. 

It was however an event simple in its character, 
unostentatious in all its circumstances, and with no 
more promise than falls to similar events ; but what 
mighty results have been, are, and will be traced to 
that event, to that day, in that humble dwelling in 
the then colony of Virginia ! The mother had no 
premonition that her son was to be called the father 
of his country, the first in war, the first in peace, and 
the first in the hearts of his countrymen. She 
watched the budding and blossoming of his mind, 



8 

and directed it with a love and wisdom not sur- 
passed, evincing that 

" A mother is a mother still, 
The holiest thing alive." 

George, however, left his paternal roof for school 
at the early age often, and with intervals continued 
at school until he arrived at the age of fifteen years, 
and during this time there was no peculiar, no pre- 
eminent evidences of future greatness. From his 
early papers, however, we learn that at the age of 
thirteen, he laid plans for business, formed rules for 
accuracy and dispatch, and embodied in fortn one 
hundred and ten aphorisms as guides for his con- 
duct, and they make a beautiful code for the forma- 
tion of a manly character— a character which he 
subsequently so nobly maintained. At the age of 
fourteen he expressed a wish to enter the British 
Navy ; but his then widowed mother was naturally 
averse to such a bold, daring, and dangerous life, 
and he was induced by her love, her persuasions, 
to give up the object of his heart, and imme- 
diately after leaving school he devoted himself to 
practical surveying among the mountains of the Al- 



leganies, and upon the banks of the Shenandoah. 
In his twentieth year he accompanied his half-bro- 
ther to the West Indies, as his companion in sick- 
ness, and upon his return the next year, and after 
the death of this brother, he succeeded by inherit- 
ance to the estate at Mount Vernon. 

This inheritance and his arriving at majority 
meet almost together, — the inheritance not large, 
even for that day, and his prospects as moderate as 
his fortune was small. 

The history of each settlement upon the Atlantic 
coast to this period, 1753, is scarcely more than the 
history of individual suffering, border war, provin- 
cial or colonial quarrel Each had peculiar interests, 
and most of the settlements peculiar notions of go- 
vernment, law, and religion. In some instances these 
settlements were combined, and together formed a 
groundwork for united action, relative rights, and 
privileges. No one settlement, however, had then 
any well denned idea for the future government of 
the inhabitants even of its own province. The mind 
seemed to be in a moulding state, ready for an im- 
pression, and it long continued so. The people of the 
several settlements had many profound elements of 



10 

government, but they were too various to be formed 
into architectural proportions, and no great temple 
was erected. This was natural, from the elements 
brought together ; from the various motives which in- 
duced the settlements ; from the impulses given to 
freedom of thought and action ; from the oppressions 
of the governments from which the pioneers came ; 
from the influences of personal suffering, personal 
danger, border savages, treacherous Indian tribes, 
French spoilers, aristocratic lords, ambitious and un- 
principled officers, narrow-minded and bigoted reli- 
gionists ; bold, free, conscientious, and noble-minded 
men and women. Such elements could form no 
beacon-lights for the future. The future must be 
moulded as it should apj>roach — government formed 
as the necessities of the various interests and wishes 
should demand. England had too much trou- 
ble at home, and was too selfish and narrow-minded 
to give to her then American Colonies true royal 
favor, or guide them as wayward or inexperienced 
children, and thus the Colonists were prevented 
from organizing any government of permanent uti- 
lity* 

* Belknap's History of Now Hampshire. 



11 

This uncertainty and these troubles were day 
by day becoming history. They were handed down 
from the first pioneer to his successors in toil and 
suffering, carried from one settlement to another by 
sturdy visitants, and the story of each became 
the prestige for personal endurance, and the sure 
pledge of final success. 

Though many of the Colonists were separated 
far from each other, they possessed a communion of 
interest, not it is true unmixed with jealousy, yet 
they were farther from the mother country, and felt 
their dependence upon each other. Their various 
positions acted upon the mind, and made it bold and 
adventurous ; upon the physical man, and made it 
strong and vigorous. The history of the people, the 
whole people of each province, would be remarkable 
at any period of the world, and it never has and 
never will be the record of a people more perfect 
in all the great constituents of being. 

During this same period, France claimed title 
to and made settlements in Canada, Nova Scotia, 
and Louisania, and attempted to connect these dis- 
tant territories by erecting posts along the banks of 
the rivers, seeking the Atlantic south of the Chesa- 



12 

peake, and thus belt the English Colonies ; and with 
the aid of the Indians, they not unfrequently were 
annoying, and even destructive to the quietness and 
peace of the Colonists. The peaceful relations be- 
tween England and France were broken, and the 
Colonists, even before the formal declaration of war, 
were parties in a bloody strife, and many of their 
sons were driven into the battle-field ; contributions 
in money, soldiers, and officers were levied, and the 
old thirteen Colonies, separated by Charters, gave 
each a quota for the common cause. In that the 
North and South were found together. Their cou- 
rage and blood were spent together, and the minute 
history of those times, portrays cruelties and suffer- 
ing, bold daring, and invincible courage, such as 
have never been surpassed. 

It was amid such scenes, such sufferings, such 
strife, such personal detail, that Washington came 
upon the stage of life, — not brilliant, but laborious ; 
not rapid, but methodical ; not learned, but thought- 
ful ; not abounding with intellectual furniture, but 
what he had, he garnered up and made personally 
valuable. He illustrated, even at that early day, 
the truth of the remark of Lord Bacon, " that read- 



. 13 

Ing makes the learned man, writing the correct 
man, conversation the ready man, and thinking the 
great man." 

The English classics, books on the various de- 
partments of science, government, law, and religion, 
then accessible, were his companions. His friends 
and business relations have left written evidences of 
his habit of writing, and legends of his conversation 
and correctness of deportment have been handed 
down to us. No one met him, who did not leave 
him with the most profound respect for the perfect 
balance of his mind, the correctness of his judg- 
ment, and the modesty of his deportment — all ele- 
ments of greatness. He was not bred in the camp ; but 
it should not be forgotten that every one at that day 
was a citizen-soldier, and lived the life of a sentinel. 
All were minute-men from necessity. Each de- 
pended upon himself for preservation, and the hour 
of danger was constant, and life even, like liberty, 
at the cost of vigilance. 

Washington's public career commences with a 
singularly meritorious -mission from the Governor of 
the Colony of Virginia to the Commander of the 
French forces on the Ohio. He passes into the British 



14 

service under Braddock, and had his counsel been 
heeded, Braddock's men would have been saved, 
and his memory freed from disgrace. He was 
elected a member of the Colonial Government 
of Virginia, a delegate to the second Continental 
Congress, and on the 15th day of June, 1775, he 
was unanimously chosen General and Commander- 
in-Chief of the American Army, and took that 
command at Cambridge, July 3rd, 1775. On 
the 4th of December, 1783, about eight years 
thereafter, he bade adieu to his companions in arms, 
and on the 23rd day of the same month, at Annapo- 
lis, he met the body which honored him with that 
great trust, and personally resigned his commission, 
closing his address to the Colonial Congress in these 
words : — " I consider it an indispensable duty to 
close this my last act of official life, by commend- 
ing the interests of our country to the protection of 
Almighty God, and those who have the superin- 
tendence of them into his holy keeping."* 

* It has been gratifying to some persons to think of Washington as a 
good man, without awarding to him the character of a Christian, and his 
life has not unfrequently been cited as an evidence of high moral worth 
without a sincere acknowledgment of the great truths of Christianity. 
This has been done by the mere lover of human nature, to elevate man as 
man ; by the religionist, who regards forms and certain peculiarities as 



15 

It was this august body of which Lord Chatham 
declared iu Parliament, that though he had studied 
and admired the free states of antiquity, the master 
spirits of the world, yet, for solidity of reasoning, 
force of sagacity, and wisdom of conclusion, no body 
of men could stand in preference to this Congress. 

The retirement Washington then sought was 
however soon disturbed by his being elected a de- 
legate from Virginia, to form a Constitution for the 
United States, and over that body he presided. 
Upon the election of President under that Constitu- 
tion, he was unanimously chosen the President of 
this new nation of freemen, and inaugurated as such 
officer on the 30th day of April, 1789, in this city. 
After a subsequent election and the filling of this 
office for two terms, he retired to Mount Vernon ; and 
after, to use his own words, " dedicating forty-five 
years of my life to the service of my country with an 
upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be 

elements of a firm belief in that power which " shapes our ends, rough hew 
them as we will." But a partial study of what remains to us of this great 
man, will satisfy any honest mind that his estimate of a protecting Provi- 
dence, a ruling and governing power, a responsible existence in man as 
developed in the word and works of God, was not below that of any of his 
fellows. 



16 

consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the 
mansions of rest." On tbe 14th day of December, 
1799, his earthly career was ended, he leaving a 
legacy to mankind unequalled in man's history. 

How these various stations were filled I need 
not say. The story has been told by a grateful 
people, it has been read by wondering millions, and 
the praise of his deeds will be household words 
whenever and wherever the love of liberty, the love 
of virtue, the love of disinterested patriotism, the 
love of a delightful and happy home, shall find rest. 

The project for the calling of a Colonial Congress 
probably originated with Franklin in 1774, but prior 
to this time, the New England Colonies had united to 
a limited extent, but each may be regarded as inde- 
pendent of the other, and of all other powers save 
the allegiance then due to the British Crown, and 
that allegiance had been questioned, had been de- 
nied, because that Government had ceased to per- 
form the duties incident to a colonial relation. Peti- 
tions for relief and redress, and remonstrances against 
cruelties and barbarities, were presented to the 
King and Parliament, but they were unheeded and 
insultingly returned, and the Colonies became so 



17 

generally dissatisfied, that in 1775 the idea of be- 
coming an independent empire,* became a popular 
sentiment, and upon the 4th day of July, 1776, the 
Colonial Congress, in the name and by the authority 

* The colonies of New England, as early as 1643, entered into a firm 
and perpetual league, offensive and defensive, in which they acted as inde- 
pendent States, and free from the control of any superior power. Each 
colony was to have exclusive jurisdiction within its own territory, but all 
points of a common concern were to be binding upon the whole confedera- 
cy, which were to be determined by a Congress composed of two commis- 
sioners from each colony. This confederacy subsisted with some altera- 
tions for upwards of forty years, and for a portion of the time with the 
countenance of the government of England. 

The position in which the colonies were placed, and their advancement, 
gradually taught the people that a more extensive union was demanded ; 
and its necessity became more and more apparent, until they were led by 
the force of irresistible motives to resort to a more perfect union. The 
unfriendly treatment of the British Parliament induced a Congress of 
delegates from nine colonies at New-York in 1765, and this Congress 
digested a bill of rights, and its assembling was preparatory to the still 
more extensive association of the colonies in 1774. This assembly, doubt- 
less, laid the foundations of our independence, and it, amid subsequent 
proceedings on the part of the British Crown, induced the twelve colonies 
to send delegates to Philadelphia to consult together for the common wel- 
fare. That Congress has been regarded as the first continental Congress, 
and its name and proceedings will five in the gratitude of a distant pos- 
terity. This Congress, the resolutions adopted, their prompt approval and 
adoption by the people, formed the Union, and " it has been revered and 
cherished as the guardian of our peace, and the only solid foundation of 
national independence." — Kent's Com. Vol. 1, p. 208. PilkirCs Politi- 
cal C. H. U. S., Vol. 1, p. 178. 2 Belknap's N. H., p. 326. 
2 



18 

of tlie good people of these Colonies, solemnly pub- 
lished and declared that these United Colonies were 
and of right ought to be feee and independent 
States, and they pledged to each other their lives, 
their fortunes, and their sacred honor, to support 
that declaration, and they prepared, signed and 
published an instrument which they called "The 

UNANIMOUS DeCLAEATION OF THE THIRTEEN UNITED 

States of Ameeica in Congeess Assembled * 

Until the 9th of this same month, when Wash- 
ington read that remarkable paper at the head of 
the American army, he, and the American troops, 
had labored only to make a cruel mother just. But 
now the word was "An Independent Empire." 
From this memorable day, and from all the future 
history of this country, the name of Colony is blotted 
out, and the several provinces assume the name and 
powers of free and independent States. That act 
made it necessary to form a general Union. Dele- 
gates of the United States of America agreed to cer- 
tain articles of confederation and perpetual union, 
under the name of "The United States of America;" 
and yet so jealous were the States, that the second 
article provides " that each State retains its sover- 

* Declaration of Independence. 



19 

eignty, freedom, and independence, and every pow- 
er, jurisdiction and right, which is not by this confed- 
eration expressly delegated to the United States in 
Congress assembled." This was a compact for the 
common defence, the security of the liberties, the 
mutual and general welfare of all. The great princi- 
ples involved in these articles proved to be true ; 
but they contained no power to enforce their own 
necessary requirements, and consequently measures 
were taken to form a Constitution, and one was per- 
fected and made binding upon the people prior to 
the 13th day of September, 1788. 

The framers of this Constitution did not suppose 
it possible to form a general union, which should 
continue to the several States composing the united 
government all their rights, and they labored to 
preserve to them all which did not seem abso- 
lutely necessary for creating a well organized na- 
tional government — a government which should be 
respected abroad, and preserve a balance of power 
among the several States, and to their inhabitants 
and to their posterity, all that any government 
could secure to any people. 

In a letter accompanying that Constitution as it 



20 

goes forth to the people, the Convention says, that 
" it is obviously impracticable to the federal govern- 
ment of these States to secure all rights of indejDen- 
dent sovereignty to each, and yet to provide for the 
interest and safety of all. Individuals entering into 
society, must give up a share of liberty to preserve 
the rest. The magnitude of the sacrifice must depend 
as well on the situation and circumstances as on the 
object to be obtained. It is at all times difficult to 
draw with precision the line between those rights 
which must be surrendered, and those which may be 
reserved ; and on the present occasion, this difficulty 
was increased by a difference among the several 
states as to their situation, extent, habits, and parti- 
cular interests. 

" In all our deliberations on this subject, we kept 
steadily in our view, that which appeared to us 
the greatest interest of every true American — the 
consolidation of our Union, in which is involved our 
prosperity, felicity, safety, perhaps our national ex- 
istence. This important consideration, seriously and 
deeply impressed on our minds, led each State to be 
less rigid on points of inferior magnitude than might 
have been otherwise expected ; and thus the Constitu- 



21 

tion, which we now present, is the result of a 
spirit of amity, and of that mutual deference and 
concession which the peculiarity of our political 
situation rendered indispensable. 

" That it will meet the full and entire ap}3robation 
of every State is not, perhaps, to be expected ; but 
each will doubtless consider, that had her interest 
alone been consulted, the consequences might have 
been particularly disagreeable or injurious to others ; 
that it is liable to as few exceptions as could rea- 
sonably have been expected, we hope and believe ; 
that it may promote the lasting welfare of that 
country so dear to us all, and secure her freedom 
and happiness, is our most ardent wish."* 

While the question of the adoption of this Con- 
stitution was pending before the people, the hour of 
peril was at the highest point. If adopted, sacrifices 
were to be made — powers surrendered, and possibly 
State rights compromised. It was to be a voluntary 
imposition, and the personal and State consequence 
was so great, the pride of opinion so mastering, and 

* This extract is from the original document deposited in the Depart- 
ment of State, by the hands of Genera] Washington, and was submitted 
by the unanimous order of the Convention, and is dated September 17th, 

1787. 



22 

the dread of a consolidated government, in its worse 
sense, so controlling, that many feared we should be 
only a fragmentary people, a people without any 
national character. The efforts however of our best 
and ablest men, the prayers and entreaties of the 
humblest citizen, finally triumphed, and Washing- 
ton, Franklin, Hamilton, Madison, Sherman, Adams, 
Jay, and a host of worthies were satisfied with their 
labors, and they were acknowledged by a grateful 
people, and they are and will be remembered by a 
grateful posterity. 

We thus became a nation, a nation composed 
of several independent governments, governments 
whose powers were perfect and entire, except such 
as were surrendered, such as were declared to be 
universal in this general and protecting organic law. 
Each State had its peculiar laws, its peculiar institu- 
tions, into which no other was allowed to look, which 
no other was allowed to question, save in those rights 
or powers embraced in the great national charter, 
The whole formed a combination of powers and in- 
cidents never before brought together in the forma- 
tion of any government, and this was the result of 
necessity, the offspring of compromise, and it was 



23 

hewed out of nature's hardest quarry, by the hands 
of men who had learned by sad experience the love 
of liberty and the cost of its enjoyments. Men who 
were willing to trust one another, because each had 
performed a necessary part in the sad history of 
those times. They believed that government was 
made for man, and not man for government ; that 
man was made a Sovereign, and not an unwilling 
subject. That he was free, and entitled to a free- 
man's life; and yet, if he wished a common pro- 
tection, a common blessing, he could and ought to 
have them, by a surrender of personal rights, 
personal opinions, settled and acknowledged by a 
written and well denned law.* 

* It is a favorite idea of many that man has of himself personal rights 
which cannot be taken away by government, and which do not belong to 
society. There may be a natural liberty, as mere theory, but it would be 
Impossible to predicate that theory upon anything the world has yet seen. 
Man cannot have a natural liberty with society. It is impossible — and yet 
" he cannot live," says Fisher Ames, " without society ; and as to liberty, 
how can I be said to enjoy that which another may take from me when he 
pleases ? The liberty of one depends not so much on the removal of all 
restraint from Km, as on the due restraint upon the liberty of others ; with- 
out such restraint there can be no liberty — liberty is so far from being en- 
dangered or destroyed by this, that it is extended and secured. We do not 
enjoy that which another may take from us. But civil liberty cannot be 
taken from us, when any one may please to invade it, for we have the 
.•strength of the society on our side." — Debates, <$-c., Massachusetts. 



24 

Tliis was a bold step in human progress ; and 
before the powers claimed were acknowledged by 
the nations of the old world, more than seven years' 
war was sustained and endured with a martyr's 
spirit. Treasure after treasure was exhausted, and 
the blood of the noblest and best of this infant 
nation flowed upon our mountains, watered the 
plains, enriched the earth, and colored our rivers. 
Fathers, sons, mothers and daughters were in the 
strife ; still all knew they would triumph. Each 
encouraged the other, each was willing to stake 
all for a common benefit. Well might Lord Chat- 
ham say in his place, of such a people, " no man more 
highly esteems and honors the English troops than I 
do. I know their valor. I know they can achieve 
any thing but impossibilities ; and I know that the 
conquest of English America is an impossibility — 
you cannot, you cannot conquer America." 

What materials for the formation of a nation of 
freemen! and with such materials what a mighty 
nation must be made — what a mighty nation has 
been made ! 

The struggles for the highest political enjoy- 
ments and honor did not however end here. The con- 



25 

sequences of the long and bloody war continued to 
be felt, and spirits were found determined to ruin 
that beautiful and fair fabric which had been so la- 
boriously erected. Still the prosperity of the coun- 
try was steady in its inarch, and the lovers of the 
new government found the asperities of the few giv- 
ing way, the institutions growing more firm, confi- 
dence daily gaining the ascendency, and the Consti- 
tution growing brighter as it was studied, and its 
beautiful balances and judicial bearing gave hope 
of permanency to the glorious Union. 

The Thirteen States, in 1791, contained only 
three millions and nine hundred and twenty-nine 
thousand inhabitants, and that number has continu- 
ed to swell, until the nation has now reached a popu- 
lation of more than twenty-three millions. Then 
the Union embraced a mere belt of land along a 
portion of the Atlantic coast, but its borders have 
been extended until it has passed rivers, mountains, 
plains and valleys, in its progress to the Pacific, and 
now it has upon its shield thirty-one States, and in 
its limits a territory, for .beauty, variety, richness, 
every thing that can belong to a nation's domain, 
surpassing those of any nation touched by the rays 
f the rising or setting sun. 



26 

This great result is the child of the Union ; and 
without that Union, and without the Constitution, 
and the compromises which made it the shield 
which is covered with such beauty, would have ere 
this, fallen from its place, and our country been un- 
known as one of the nations of the earth. The Union 
has given us " the security for life, liberty, and the 
pursuit of happiness." 

This is the inheritance Washington and his com- 
patriots have left us — left Americans. 

He too, has left to us, to the world, his life, his 
example. A life not surpassed for its virtue, its self- 
sacrifice, its noble bearing, its almost miraculous in- 
cidents. A life which has been, and will be studied 
as long as good examples find students, lovers of lib- 
erty find an abiding place, or tyrants find people to 
oppress. 

" They have toiled, and in their country's cause 
Bled nobly, and their works, as they deserve, 
Receive proud recompense. We give in charge 
Their names to the sweet lyre. The historic muse, 
Proud of her treasure, marches with it down 
To latest times : and sculpture in her turn 
Gives bond in stone, and ever-during brass, 
To guard them, and immortalize her trust." 



27 

The government Washington and our fathers 
formed, is one belonging most emphatically to the 
people ; it had no precedent in its formation, and has 
no parallel in its history.* Its powers, as well as its 
privileges, spring from the people ; they are the foun- 
tain from which the clear and beautiful waters gush, 
and they pass on from the mountain-top, through 
the various channels prescribed by the great land- 
mark of the country, and seek amid plains, and 
mountains, gorges, and ravines, the peaceful ocean 
of the American Union. 

The current thus far has not unfrequently found 
obstacles, but its course has been onward, and its 
waters clear and resistless, yet like every thing hu- 
man, the landmark has seeds, which though they may 
be visible only to the eye of the microscopist, may 
grow and become so firmly rooted, that he who at- 

* The Constitution was ratified not by States as States, but by the people. 
Dr. Jarvis, in the Massachusetts Convention on the adoption of the federal 
Constitution, says, "Under what authority are we acting, and to what 
tribunal are we amenable ? Is it from the late federal Convention that we 
derive our authority ? Is it from Congress, or is it even from the legisla- 
ture itself? It is from neither ; we are convened in right of the people, as 
their immediate representatives, to execute the most important trust which 
it is possible to receive ; and we are accountable in its execution to God 
only, and our own consciences." — Debates, cf-c, 155. 



28 

tempts to pluck them up will find that the elements 
of security are gone, and the hope of freemen lost 
for ever. 

The far-seeing eye of Washington saw this. His 
solicitude and admonitions have come to us like the 
voice of one from the dead, like the voice of many 
waters. He taught "by example what the duties of 
an American citizen were, he left written counsel to 
his countrymen, and offered devout prayer to the 
Great Governor of the Universe, to protect, guard 
and prosper, this then young nation. 

"There are," says this great man,* "four things 

* The circumstances which called forth the address of which these 
extracts are a portion, are interesting, and their insertion in a note will add 
value to the extracts themselves. The definitive Treaty of Peace between 
his Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, was signed at 
Paris the 3d clay of September, 1783, and it was ratified by the American 
Congress the 14th of January, 1784. Cessation of hostilities was pro- 
claimed in the American army on the 19th of April, 1783, and the army 
disbanded on the third of November following. 

The conclusion of peace, and the disbanding of the army, were events 
teeming with consequence, and many a man's stout heart was made to 
throb with fear. Almost ten thousand men, who had long been banded 
together for a common cause, were to learn war no more, and leave associ- 
ates in toil and suffering, unclad, unpaid, and without habits fitting them 
for attaining the ordinary necessaries of life. At this time Washington's 
Head-Quarters were at Newburgh, and most of the officers of the army 
were with him. Congress, at the same time, was in session at Annapolis, 



29 

winch I humbly conceive essential to the well-being, 
I may venture to say to the existence of the United 
States, as an independent power. 

Maryland, — but it could not levy taxes upon the almost worn out citizens, 
then, as members of the Federal or State governments, indebted in the sum 
of about sixty-six millions of dollars, — to meet the suffering demands of the 
army : and no resource could be found to alleviate their sufferings save 
that which time would bring to them, and that, to men|frus situated, was 
hope deferred, which did, indeed, make many a heart sick. 

Associated with such men, and that too as their commander, under such 
circumstances, was not an event of ordinary life ; and it was not a trial 
ordinary men could pass through unharmed. Discontent was abroad in 
the army, and especially among the officers. It was intimated to Wash- 
ington by one of the oldest and most respectable colonels, that a Republi- 
can Government could not be stable, that an Independent Monarchy had 
better be established, and that the army desired their Commander-in-Chief 
to be King. 

This proposition was rebuked sternly, and the proffered crown, even 
from the hands of a devoted army, indignantly refused. Immediately after, 
the officers of the army memorialized Congress, but Congress could do 
nothing available, and the want of their action produced a ferment among 
the officers, and through them the whole army became excited, and many 
determined to take measures which should at least be satisfactory to them. 
A call for a meeting of the general and field officers and a commissioned 
officer from each company, was circulated in the camp at Newburgh, 
accompanied with an anonymous letter, complaining of their hardships,' 
and insisting that their country trampled upon their rights, disdained their 
cries, and insulted their distresses. 

This letter was written with great ability, and the effect for the moment 
was all controlling. Its paternity was attributed to officers then very high 
in rank, and the probable mover of the project subsequent to the circula- 
tion of the letter received orders from the Commander-in-Chief to preside 



30 

" 1st. An indissoluble union of the States, under 
one federal head. 

" 2d. A sacred regard to public justice. 

"3d The adoption of a proper peace establish- 
ment. 

"4 th. The prevalence of that pacific and friendly 
disposition afnong the people of the United States, 

at the meeting when it should take place, and make return to him of its 
proceedings. This meeting Washington attended in person, and the 
speech he then made is one of the most beautiful, eloquent and patriotic 
speeches in the language we speak. The natural effect of such a letter, 
and the meeting it called, certainly gave rise to the most fearful fore- 
bodings : though since the events of the day the writer has acknowledged 
the authorship, and claimed for himself the purest of motives ; and it 
might be better for the reputation of his superior, who presided at the 
meeting, if his motives were regarded by himself even as praiseworthy. 
The effect of this prudent and masterly policy of Washington was exceed- 
ingly happy, and yet the demands of the army were so pressing that it 
required in them sacrifices almost too heavy to be borne, and a patience 
almost beyond the possession of man. Washington felt this, and he feared 
its consequences, and on the 18th day of June, 1783, he sent from New- 
burgh a circular letter to the Governors of the several States, as his last 
and farewell address to them on surrendering his great trust. It is from 
this letter these extracts are taken, and it is, of all Washington's public 
documents, the best. It is full of instruction, full of beauty, full of patri- 
otism, and no one has ever ventured to question that Washington was its 
sole author. It should be taken from a comparative obscurity, and be 
written upon the tables of every child's heart within the limits of that 
government its author then rescued from imminent peril, and which must 
live while the sentiments of the letter find favor in the hearts of a grateful 
people. 



31 

which, will induce them to forget their local preju- 
dices and politics, to make those mutual concessions 
which are requisite to the general prosperity, and in 
some instances to sacrifice their individual advanta- 
ges to the interests of the community. These are 
the pillars on which the glorious fabric of our inde- 
pendence and national character must be supported. 
Liberty is the basis, and whoever would dare to sap 
the foundation, or overturn the structure, under 
whatever specious pretext, he who may attempt it 
will merit the bitterest execration and the severest 
punishment which can be inflicted by his injured 
country. It will be a part of my duty, and that of 
every patriot, to assert without reserve that unless 
the States will suffer Congress to exercise those prero- 
gatives they are undoubtedly invested with by the 
Constitution, every thing must very rapidly tend to 
anarchy and confusion. That it is indispensable to 
the happiness of the individual States that there 
should be lodged somewhere, a supreme power, to 
regulate and govern the general concerns of the con- 
federated republic, without which the Union cannot 
be of long duration. There must be a faithful and 
pointed compliance on the part of every State with 



32 

the late proposals and demands of Congress, or the 
most fatal consequences will ensue. That whatever 
measures have a tendency to dissolve the Union, or 
contribute to violate or lessen the sovereign author- 
ity, ought to be considered as hostile to the liberty 
and independence of America, and the authors of 
them treated accordingly. That unless we can be 
enabled by the concurrence of the States to parti- 
cipate in the fruits of the revolution, and enjoy the 
essential benefits of civil society, under a form of 
government so free and uncorrupted, so happily 
guarded against the danger of oppression, as has 
been devised and adopted by the articles of confed- 
eration, it will be the subject of regret that so much 
blood and treasure have been lavished for no pur- 
pose ; that so many sufferings have been encountered 
without a compensation, and that so many sacrifices 
have been made in vain. It is only in our united 
character, as an empire, that our independence is 
acknowledged, that our power can be regarded. The 
treaties of the European Powers with the United 
States of America, will have no validity on the dis- 
solution of the Union. If, after all, a spirit of dis- 
union or a temper of obstinacy or perverseness 



33 

should manifest itself in any of the States, if such 
an ungracious disposition should attempt to frustrate 
all the happy effects which might be expected to 
flow from the Union, that State alone which puts 
itself in opposition to the aggregate wisdom of the 
continent, and follows such mistaken and pernicious 
counsels, will be responsible for all the consequences.' 

"And now, I make it my earnest prayer that 
God would incline the hearts of the citizens to culti- 
vate a spirit of subordination and obedience to gov- 
ernment, to entertain a brotherly affection and love 
for one another, for their fellow-citizens of the United 
States at large, and that he would most graciously 
be pleased to dispose us all to do justice, to love 
mercy, and to demean ourselves with that charity, 
humility, and pacific temper of the mind, which 
were the characteristics of the Divine Author of 
our blessed religion ; without an humble imitation 
of whose example in these things, we can never hope 
to be a happy nation." 

This prayer, and these words of wisdom, were ut- 
tered by Washington while the States were united 
under the articles of confederation, but they were 
then timely, and doubtless contributed in saving the 



34 

country from anarchy and confusion. Subsequent to 
the adoption of the constitution, and in his farewell 
address, 

He says,* " the unity of government which consti- 
tutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is 
justly so ; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of 
your real independence, the support of your tran- 
quillity at home, your peace abroad, of your safety, 
of your prosperity, of that very liberty which you 
so highly prize. It is of infinite moment that you 
should properly estimate the immense value of your 
National Union, to your collateral and individual 
happiness ; that you should cherish a cordial, habit- 
ual, and immovable attachment to it ; accustoming 
yourselves to think and to speak of it as a palladi- 
um of your political safety and prosperity, watching 
for its preservation with a jealous anxiety ; discoun- 
tenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion 
that it can in any event be abandoned ; and indig- 
nantly frowning upon the first dawning of every at- 
tempt to alienate any portion of our country from 
the rest, or enfeeble the sacred ties which now link 
together the various parts. To the efficacy and per- 

* Washington's Farewell Address. 



35 

manency of your Union, a government for the whole 
is indispensable. This government, the offspring of 
your own choice, uninfluenced, and unawed, adopt- 
ed upon full investigation and mature deliberation, 
completely free in all its principles, in the distribu- 
tion of its powers, uniting security with energy, and 
containing within itself provision for its own amend- 
ment, has a just claim to your confidence and your 
support. Respect for its authority, compliance with 
its laws, acquiescence in its measures and duties, en- 
joined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. 
The basis of our political system is the right of the 
people to make and to alter their constitutions of 
government. But the constitution which at any 
time exists, until changed by an explicit and authen- 
tic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory 
upon all. The very idea of the power and the right 
of the people to establish government, pre-supposes 
the duty of every individual to obey the established 
government. All obstructions to the execution of the 
laws, all combinations and associations, under what- 
ever pla'usible character, with the real design to di- 
rect, control, counteract, or awe the regular delibe- 
rations and actions of the constituted authorities, 



36 

are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of 
fatal tendency. 

" Toward the preservation of your government 
and the permanency of your present happy state, it is 
requisite not only that you steadily discountenance 
irregular opposition to its acknowledged authority, 
but also that you resist with care the spirit of innova- 
tion upon its principles, however specious the pretext. 

" In offering to you, my countrymen, these coun- 
sels of an old affectionate friend, I natter myself that 
they may be productive of some partial benefit, 
some occasional good ; that they may now and then 
recur, to moderate the fury of party spirit, to warn 
against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue, to guard 
against the impositions of pretended patriotism; 
this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude 
for your welfare by which they have been dictated." 

Notwithstanding these words of wisdom, of coun- 
sel, the history of this country, since the adoption 
of the Constitution, embracing a period of only 
about sixty-three years, marks more than one at- 
tempt to sever the Union which cost so much blood 
and treasure, which our fathers regarded above all 
price, and which has given to a nation unnumbered 



37 

blessings, and to the world the hope of freedom. 
Thus far, the attempts have been futile. How long 
they are to continue futile, the wisest cannot tell. 
The seeds have been sown, broad-cast, and the reap- 
ers have named the price for the harvest, and the 
Statesman is looking to the future, but not without 
fear and apprehension. 

Government, like every thing earthly, has in 
itself the elements of decay, of its own dissolution. 
Motion is destructive in its tendency, life has its 
germs of death, and the more rapid its progress, 
the greater the danger of its cessation. The vital 
element of our national institutions is working its 
own ruin, and that will be accomplished, unless re- 
newed efforts are made to counteract that tendency. 
It cannot be otherwise. Sectional interest is mak- 
ing her claims for a surrender of granted powers. 
Ambition is starting out from her hiding-places, and 
seeking her, gratification, and the narrow-minded 
theorist is exerting himself to try his hand at some 
new scheme for freedom. The cant and learning of 
other lands have been liberally lavished, to weaken 
our bond of freedom, to make us sick of our bless- 
ings, the fruits of the sufferings, toils, and wisdom of 
our fathers. 



38 

The love of progress, " manifest destiny," has 
been invoked to work the wisdom of the past into 
foolishness. 

These elements look not to the great work of de- 
struction, simply, but to the attainment of single 
objects without reference to general consequences. 
They are narrow, they are selfish, yet they are con- 
tinuing, never ceasing. The history of our great- 
ness, our freedom, our national prosperity, is studied 
without reference to what they have cost, without 
reference to the drawbacks upon manfe freedom in 
other governments. We are forgetting the stone 
from which we were hewn, we are subjecting our- 
selves to party domination, and party domination is 
seeking success, rather than a patriotic purpose ; 
we are giving up a strictly national feeling, a pride 
of American birth, for a cosmopolite existence. We 
are forgetting that he who cannot glory in an Amer- 
ican birth-place, cannot feel the full value of the 
American Union. He knows liberty from what he 
possesses, he knows little States and their depen- 
dencies, but he cannot fully comprehend the value 
of our great national compact, a compact bought by 
sufferings, made by compromises, and submitted to 



39 

by a free people, by independent sovereignties, " in 
order to form a more perfect Union, establish jus- 
tice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the 
common defence, promote the general welfare, and 
secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our 
posterity." This is apparent to the most casual ob- 
server of human nature, and by it one of the great 
fastenings of this Union is lost, its value lessened. 
The obligations imposed by the original compact, 
with its assurances of good faith, are consequently 
weakened, and the tone of defiance to law unblush- 
ingly made. The fountains of a common education 
have not always been the sources of a pure morality, 
a religious faith, and the doctrines taught have 
not always been American in their tendency. 

The South has arrogated powers to herself not 
authorized by the constitution, and the North has 
not been backward in claiming that her mantle of 
charity should be extended over some of the sins of 
her sister States. 

Not a few have been loud for a law higher and 
more binding upon the nation than the constitution 
they have sworn to obey, forgetting that if the 



40 

constitution and laws are wrong, that the duty im- 
posed is to make them right in the way the com- 
pact, the obligation, has pointed out. Freedom to 
them is lawlessness, licentiousness. They do not re- 
cognize the truth that " law is the god of wise men, 
licentiousness the god of fools."* 

This day has come, and it will go with little prof- 
it from its Association, unless it strengthens us in our 
duties as American citizens, unless it gives new life 
and energy to our patriotic purposes ; and I trust 
you will not deem it improper if I call to your mind 
some of the principles of our Order — " The Order 
of United Americans," — and suggest some duties 
which flow from them. 

" Our political action," says the preamble of our 
organic law, " will be adapted to the exigency of the 
crisis that may arise ; but our polar star shall ever 
be the salvation of our country and its institutions." 
We disclaim all association with party politics : we 
hold no connection with party men, but we avow 
most distinctly our purpose of doing whatever may 
seem best to us for sustaining our national institu- 

. * Plato. 



41 

tions, for upholding our national liberties, and for 
freeing them wholly from all foreign and deleterious 
influences whatever. 

" Whenever it shall appear to us that foreign in- 
terests, political or religious, are operating in any 
manner injuriously to our country, we shall hold it 
to be our duty to resort to all lawful means to coun- 
teract them. 

" But we declare our steadfast adherence to that 
feature of our institutions which secures to every 
man protection in his civil and religious rights." 

The mere utterance of principles may be useful, 
may lead to salutary results, but when they are 
lodged in young minds, and become the fountain of 
action, they are more than " apples of gold, in pic- 
tures of silver," they are the lightning of Franklin, 
under the guidance of modern invention and mod- 
ern science. A careful observer of man says, " that 
the world is governed by persons between the age 
of twenty and thirty-five," and this axiom finds apt 
illustration in the early and latter history of our 
own country.* 

* This remark will scarcely be credited, and yet the history of the ac- 
tors upon life's busy way will satisfy the inquirer that it is true. Alexan- 



42 

The duties imposed upon us as American citizens 
are too numerous to find place in a single discourse. 
They embrace almost all the duties of life ; they are 
found at the fireside, at the place of labor, the mart 
of commerce, the chamber of the student, in the 
temples of justice, the halls of legislation, and in 
the executive departments of the government. 

He who fills the highest station among men is 
placed there for a few days only, by the expressed 
will of those whom the constitution calls citizens, 
not subjects ; and when those days are numbered, the 

der, the conqueror of the then civilized world, died at the age of thirty- 
three. Bonaparte was crowned Emperor of France at thirty-three. Pitt, 
the eloquent Pitt, was only about twenty when, in the Parliament of 
Great Britain , he boldly advocated the cause of the American colonies, and 
but twenty-two when made Chancellor of the Exchequer. Edmund 
Burke, at the age of twenty-five, was the first Lord of the Treasury. 
Sir Isaac Newton, at the age of thirty, occupied the mechanical chair at 
Cambridge, England, then having made his name immortal. Washington 
was only twenty-five when he covered the retreat of the British at Brad- 
dock's defeat, and when he was appointed commander-in-chief of all 
the Virginia forces. Alexander Hamilton was only twenty when aid to 
General Washington, and only thirty when he wrote the essays on the 
adoption of the federal Constitution, and at thirty-two he was Secretary 
of the Treasury. Thomas Jefferson was but thirty-three when he drafted 
the Declaration of Independence, and the average age of the fifty-six sign- 
ers of that declaration is only about forty-three years. The youngest, 
Edward Rutledge, of South Carolina, was twenty-seven, and the eldest, 
Benjamin Franklin, of Massachusetts, seventy. 



43 

same citizens again use their power in a still, quiet, 
yet resistless way, and put another in the chair the 
law has made vacant. These changes, with their 
peculiarities, characterize all the political offices 
known to Americans. We know no divine right of 
kiugs — we recognize no doctrine of the Holy Alli- 
ance, " that all useful and necessary changes ought 
only to emanate from the free will and intelligent 
conviction of those whom God has made responsi- 
ble for power." The authority of our rulers is mere- 
ly a delegated authority, to be ever used and con- 
trolled by the written law of the land, which is 
simply the authentic expression of the will of the 
people. " Her seat is the bosom of the people, her 
voice, the harmony of society ; all men in every sta- 
tion do her reverence ; the very least as feeling her 
care, and the very greatest as not exempted from 
her power ; and though each, in different sort and 
manner, yet all with uniform consent admiring her 
as the mother of their peace and joy." 

The first and most sacred duty, then, imposed 
upon the American citizen, is that of selecting the 
best and most patriotic rulers. The surest, the al- 
most only way to accomplish this, is to insist that 



44 

each ballot shall be the representative of an intelli- 
gent mind, and the index of an honest purpose. 
Ignorance will not accomplish this, a vicious mind 
will not allow it. " The great bulwark of republi- 
can government is the cultivation of education ; for 
the right of suffrage cannot be exercised in a salu- 
tary manner without intelligence." 

" The general diffusion of knowledge is the pre- 
cursor and protector of republican institutions ; and 
in it we must confide, as the conservative power that 
will watch over our liberties, and guard them against 
fraud, intrigue, corruption, and violence."* 

And how appropriate is the language of Wash- 
ington, who said in his last message to Congress, " ac- 
tuated by that fervent love toward my country 
which is so natural to a man who views in it the na- 
tive soil of himself and his progenitors, for several 
generations, that the assimilation of the principles, 
opinions, and manners, of our countrymen, by the 
common education of a portion of our youth from 
every quarter, deserves attention. The more homo- 
geneous our citizens can be made in these particulars, 
the greater will be our prospect of permanent union. 

* De Witt Clinton. 



45 

And a primary object should be the education of our 
youth in the science of government. In a republic, 
what species of knowledge can be equally important ? 
and what duty more pressing on its legislature than 
to patronize a plan for communicating it to those who 
are to be the future guardians of the liberties of the 
country ?" 

How different is this voice from some mod- 
ern theorists who would educate a portion of our in- 
habitants in the laDguage, religion, and customs of 
the country from which they came ! It seems like 
the voice of inspiration. It comes with authority ; 
and if such principles were made practical, and our 
youth educated after the Washington school of vir- 
tue, religion, and patriotism, the hour of danger to 
the American Union would be postponed until the 
Heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll, aud the 
elements melt with fervent heat. This great element 
of power, ambitious and unprincipled men under- 
stand ; and it is an engine, too, they can employ, and 
unless that power is wisely directed, and the great 
and benign principles of our fathers preserved, we 
shall have proved to us that it does not take public 
instruction a century to transform the world, but 



46 

that its power lias become accelerated with the ad- 
vances of science and the arts. No danger lies deep- 
er, no power in the hands of demagogues is so re- 
sistless. " Every effort," says De Witt Clinton in 
his last message, " ought therefore to be made, to 
fortify our free institutions, and the great bulwark of 
security is to be formed in education ; the culture 
of the heart and the head ; the diffusion of know- 
ledge, piety, and morality." Upon education, then, 
we must rely for the purity, the preservation, and 
the perj>etuation of republican government. And, 
says "Washington, " of all the dispositions and habits 
which lead to political prosperity, religion and mo- 
rality are indispensable supports. In vain would 
that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should 
labor to subvert these great pillars of human happi- 
ness, these firmest props of the duties of men and 
citizens. Whatever may be conceded to the influence 
of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, 
reason and experience both forbid us to expect that 
national morality can prevail in exclusion of reli- 
gious principle." 

The education must be national, the sympathies 
national, or we shall become the broken fragments 



47 

of a great nation, the offal of miserable fools and 
fanatics, the by-word and reproach of all good 
men. 

Another prominent danger into which we may 
fall, and which may make shipwreck of the Union, 
is the unbending demand of party. This not un- 
frequently warps the best and noblest of men, if it 
does not crush them. An ambitious man may have 
courage to stand at the cannon's mouth, and wait 
nerveless the approach of the engine of death, 
while he would shudder and give way at the de- 
mand of party. To think and act at the behest of 
judgment and conscience against party demands, re- 
quires a courage few are found to possess ; 

" And yet, unless above himself he can 
Erect himself, how mean a thing is man !" 

Let me, says Washington, " warn you in the 
most solemn manner against the baneful effects of 
the spirit of party generally. It opens the door to 
foreign influence and corruption, which finds a facili- 
tated access to the government itself, through the 
channels of party passions." And how grateful it is 
to find the author of our Declaration of. Independ- 
ence saying that " I never submitted the whole sys- 



48 

tern of my opinions to the creed of any party) 
men whatever, in religion, in philosophy, in politics, 
or any thing else, where I was capable of thinking 
for myself. Such an addition is the last degrada- 
tion of a free and moral agent. If I could not go 
to heaven but with a party, I would not go there 
at all,"* Such principles duty imposes upon us, and 
such principles may demand of us a martyr's cour- 
age, and a martyr's end. 

I need not, perhaps ought not, to give any in- 
stances of high courage, such as this principle im- 
plies, for in doing it the catalogue might be regard- 
ed as too narrow ; and yet there has been, withiu the 
last twelve months, such a striking display of this 
noble virtue, and it is so rare, and it has been in 
these instances so universally admitted and admir- 
ed, that I venture to name Dickinson, Foote, Cass, 
Webster, and Clay. Names we shall cherish while 
the Union lasts, and if it is broken, they will be 
found glittering among the fragments. 

Washington warns us of another prominent dan- 
ger, when he says, in his farewell address, " Against 
the insidious wiles of foreign influence, I conjure 

* Jefferson's Works. Vol. ii. p. 438. 



49 

you to believe me, fellow-citizens, the jealousies of a 
free people ought to be constantly awake, since his- 
tory and experience prove that foreign influence is 
one of the most baneful foes to a republican gov- 
ernment." This apprehension of Washington did 
not, however, prevent his doing justice to those who 
then were among us, or who came among us to aid 
in the great struggle for political freedom. He felt, 
as all others did, that a debt of gratitude was due to 
La Fayette, De Strang, Lee, Kosciusko, Pulaski, 
Steuben, De Kalb, Conway and Jones, which could 
not then be cancelled, and this we and posterity 
cannot cancel. He believed that our foreign rela- 
tions should be upheld upon the principle of strict 
neutrality, and that no nation should dictate to us, 
or the people of any nation, in any form, what our 
duties were. Duty demands of us the same catho- 
lic spirit, the same sleepless watchfulness. We should 
hail the assistance of all, the good of all, from all 
climes ; and when they cOme among us, we should 
use every endeavor to make their stay happy, and 
them homogeneous with ourselves ; but in doing this 
we should not forget that God has given to man, a 

love of country, man cannot obliterate ; a love of 
4 



50 

home, lie cannot forget ; and that the first impres- 
sions of life are among the last we surrender. 

We may improve our faculties, modify our judg- 
ments, but we cannot pass the great landmarks God 
has implanted in our nature. Wisdom, experience, 
and history, all tell us that he is the best citizen, the 
best patriot, the safest national guide, who can find 
in his country's domain, the soil where he and his 
fathers were born. This is true, amid the icebergs 
of the North, the soft-tinted skies of the South, in 
the dungeon of the serf, and in the land where 
George Washington was born. 

Breathes there a man, with soul so dead, 
Who never to himself hath said, 

This is my own, my native land ! 
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burn'd, 
As home his footsteps he hath turn'd 

From wandering on a foreign strand ! 
If such there breathe, go, mark him well ; 
For him no minstrel raptures swell; 
High though his titles, proud his name, 
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim ; 
Des pite these titles, power, and pelf, 
The wretch, concentred all in self, 
Living, shall forfeit fair renown, 
And, doubly dying, shall go down 



51 

To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, 
Unwept, unhonor'd, and unsung.* 

Another duty imposed upon us as American cit- 
izens, is a quiet and resigned submission to law while 
it is law. The majority must govern, according to 
the written code, or we become traitors to our coun- 
try, violators of an imposed or consented obligation. 
Our will, if arraigned against law, is in truth the as- 
sertion of the traitor, and if it becomes active, the 
possessor deserves a traitor's fate. 

Another duty imposed upon us, is watchfulness, 
is action. The price of liberty is vigilance, the want 
of it, danger of despotism — despotism of the worst 
kind. 

Our country, our free institutions, are the best 
known to man — they are peculiarly the people's,, 
and their preservation, under a kind Providence, is- 
now in our keeping. The principles of Washington 
will perpetuate them, and the more we go to the 
fountain he has left us, the better and purer will be 
our life, the safer and happier the people of the 
greatest prospective government in the world. 

Let this day, then, witness our patriotic devotion, 

* Sir Walter Scott. 



52 

our high resolve to live for ourselves, our friends and 
our country, and though our nation's bark be rocked, 
the tempest of passion run high, the narrowness of 
sectional interest be loud in its demands, the cry of 
oppression interfere with reserved and guaranteed 
powers, our pledge is given, that no star shall be 
plucked from its fellows, that no stripe shall be torn 
from the nag of the Union, and that the eagle shall 
perch upon our Capitol, and be borne to every 
nation, upon the top-gallant mast of America's 
proud navy. 



